21st Century Witchdoctor

I can’t sleep. In the past, when sleep has evaded me, it has always been caused by some garish nightmare, or else a book about a suffering part of the world, a documentary on war; in short, anything reminding me that there exists somewhere lives far more painful than mine, and that I am helpless in preventing them. I used to feel sick. From the one cause of concern that the dream or book or film had raised, I’d progress until I’d thought about every other horrific thing I knew of in the world, until I was crippled with inadequacy in the face of it all. 

Suddenly, I’d be so helpless that I’d be sure all these things would fall on me someday. I’d feel destined to die awfully in a nuclear war (or any other kind of war for that matter), or wiped out with disease, or, if I managed to pass through this life happily, I would surely meet an awful afterlife where I would be punished for my helplessness; for my ingratitude at the easy life I had often complained of. I would be reincarnated until everything bad had happened to me. These thoughts made me sicker still. Sitting up in my bed I would pray for forgiveness, or else write wild love stories to distract myself,  pace about until I was tired, or creep in to my mother’s bedroom, climb beneath the sheets and cling to her body through the darkness that I felt as much as I could see. I was haunted by a half dream I had once when I was still partially awake. In this dream I saw boxes lowered into a large pit, one on top of the other. On closer inspection, I saw one had my initials painted on it, large and red. My eyes jerked open, and for a long time I was convinced I’d foreseen that I would be buried in a mass grave. Now that I think about it, it’s nice that somebody had added the initials. 

Now, though my restlessness is caused by the same things, I do not worry about death or about anything in the future. There may well be horrific things to come in my life, but right now I am safe, and I have no use for phantom possibilities. I do not feel so helpless. I think the most important thing you can do is to make yourself as peaceful as possible. We are all part of an incomprehensible whole and if the little bit of energy you experience and are responsible for, if you can make that as content and as peaceful as possible, then I think you are doing all you can for the world and the daunting expanse of space and time around you. You can feel it in your body, a kind of vast stillness; there is no twitching resentment or regrets, no dislike of anything or anyone. You are sympathetic and understanding towards that which would once have frustrated you. 

Slowly, you can not worry for possible evils creeping in the past and the future, in the unseen present. You are consumed with peace and it is radiating from you, a chain of cause and effect; if you are pure peace then you can cause only peace. You are doing all that you can. You are neither permitting or permeating that most destructive of things: fear. You may rest. You may sleep. 

Though I sat with my back to them they were still visible in the shadows that dominated the wall in front of me. The others scattered themselves about the room, still trying to find the chess piece that had gone missing earlier. “Helen are you going to help us, please?” demanded Joey, bored of trying. 

No one was searching near Howell and Saskia. I approached them and began running my hands along the shelves over their heads.

“Has no one found that rook yet?” Saskia’s voice was so bright and cheerful that I was compelled to take a step back and look at her. Howell shifted uncomfortably. The two of them together looked like a question that I was supposed to ask, but didn’t want to. Taking a deep breath, I went back to feeling along the shelves. Out of the corner of my eye I could see the two of them sitting very still.

“Do either of you have any idea where the chess piece might be?” The question had pulled me back and catapulted from my mouth before I could stop it. “She thinks we have it,” said Howell, his eyes fixed on Saskia. Her cupid lips parted slightly. “No, Helen was just asking”, she smiled, before adding; “sorry, we don’t.” I spotted a loose bit of carpet in the corner and went to kneel next to it, pulling it back a little to check for the piece.

“Have you ever hid anything? I’ve always thought you look a bit like a secret.” Howell’s voice sounded as though his lips were pulling back into a smile. I shifted round so I could see Saskia’s face while she answered.

“People hide things in me.”

Howell grinned. “Saskia the treasure chest.”

“Oh it’s not always a pleasurable job,” whispered Saskia; her hand rising to the base of her throat almost involuntarily. “In the centre of my ribcage, there is a hummingbird.”

Howell’s eyebrows rose. “I didn’t think you would have a tattoo.”

“I don’t,” Saskia replied. “It isn’t a tattoo; it’s a real hummingbird. Between my lungs.” She paused for a moment. “Well, it isn’t a hummingbird yet, it’s just an egg, but it will hatch into one.”

Now Howell’s eyebrows pulled together. “Really?” He waited for her to nod. “Well what is it made from?”

Saskia looked deep in thought. “I’m not sure really, whatever all other bird’s eggs are made from I suppose.”

James looked up from his counting. “Calcium mainly, isn’t it?”

Saskia smiled at him. Howell swivelled himself around to look at her properly. “How did you get it there?”

A hint of impatience flickered in her eyes. “I really don’t know.”

 “Well that‘s that then,” Howell laughed; “There isn’t the egg of a hummingbird inside you!”

Saskia remained defiant. “There is, I can feel it; the weight of it sitting on my breastbone.”

Daisy crawled out from under the table giggling. “What are you on about Saskia?” she chuckled.

The crowd that had gathered around Saskia reminded me of the way we all used to sit to hear a story. I felt a rush of longing for normal things like that again, so moved closer to listen as she repeated what she had been saying to Daisy. With eyes shut, perhaps I wouldn’t believe her, but there was something about the way she stared as she spoke that made me doubt everything I’d been taught before, whilst rendering me incapable of looking away. I could tell the others felt the same; a shiver of discomfort seemed to pass between us. “I don’t believe you one bit,” said Daisy, screwing up one side of her face. “You always tell lies.”

“Oh you understand, don’t you Helen?” Saskia suddenly grabbed my shoulder and dragged her hand all the way down my arm towards my wrist where she hung on as she got up from her seat, pulling me towards the little moonlight that managed to filter through the crimson clouds; pressing itself up against the window.  “Look,” she cried, tilting her head back so that the light made her neck glow a pale and terrifying orange; “Look, can’t you see it trying to escape?” Her other hand began pulling the top buttons on her shirt open. The rest ran over to us, peering over each other’s heads, nobody wanting to be at the front yet everybody eager to watch.  “It’s here, it’s here!” Saskia shrieked. One of the younger girls screamed, and for a second I thought I saw something leap beneath Saskia’s skin. 

Howell, the only one to have not joined the crowd, got up suddenly, his head hitting the shelf above him with a sickening crack. We all turned to look from one outcast to the other. The shelf had come loose where his head had collided with it, tilting up so that the whole thing was slanted. Something rolled the length of the wood and landed on the floor in front of an abandoned torch. The shadow of the lost rook towered enormous on the wall. 

I sit in the morning bleary eyed, knees pulled up to my chin, my voice hoarse. Sometimes I feel suddenly out of place. I have not done things before and I wonder if I should have by now. I am an alien. Though I am not afraid of the clinical smell and “open wide” of the dentist’s, nor the metal instruments down throats, I haven’t been for a very long time. I simply do not care that my teeth are wonky. Eventually I suppose they will all fall out, but this will not be for years to come when I’ll be so filthy rich that I can fill all the holes in with gold and throw back my head and laugh about it to show them all off. Or else I’ll be poor and alone. I will be the house I inhabit; boarded up at the corners, isolated from the world. I’ll creep out at 5 in the mornings and deliver cold glass bottles of milk to doorsteps, back in by eight and asleep again by half past on a mattress with springs coming out. I’ll sleep and sleep and write and write, not caring for the rest of the world or indeed for the rest of the world’s uniform smiles. Building born crooked and uncaring, I am characteristically happy with you; now unable to tell the difference between your red brick wonder and the portrait of myself I hang in your hall. We stand tall until we are hollowed out with time, carved in to proud ruins. Change is not defeat. 

UPDATE: I have started to read the newspaper and post about real life. 

In the evening, I hold his face with my hands, press the length of me against his side, kiss his eyelids as he sleeps. There are many awful things in the world and I will guard our happiness from them, curled around him like a predator, ready to snarl at anyone threatening this fragile thing, this impossible truth. Hair fallen over to one side, I press my forehead to his. I imagine the purest peace possible and think it in to his skin, blinding his worries with a vast magnolia calm, a cream happiness, a lovely, unassuming white sealed with a jawline kiss. Concentrating hard on the safety of his hand spread in a solid, wide warmth across the flat of my back, I listen to his breathing; heavy one minute and then impossibly silent the next. Amid this impenetrable quiet I can only feel that he is alive; we rise and fall together, I breathe with him. His head turns, floating between realities, there is a sound that is words; he loves me. More precious, silent minutes, blossom in to existence as he sleeps still and I guard him more fiercely than ever. Somewhere a clock chimes, somewhere a life changing decision has been made, somewhere a wasp stings, somewhere there is not enough water, somewhere keys have been lost, somewhere a marriage has fallen apart; all these things happening, mundane and monumental, all the time. He wakes at last, asks if he fell asleep. I smile and as he checks his phone I hope I have restored him, or else given him a deposit of strength that, if he doesn’t need now, he can use one day. One day, when we aren’t as lucky as we are now; when we’ve become caught up in all those somewhere’s, perhaps far away from each other, perhaps lonely, perhaps afraid. But we do not dwell on any perhaps. We have the present, and we are happy in it. 

I was younger than you when I first realised how ancient I was. My face was freckled with sun exposure but not yet dragging wrinkles out of every feature; the eyes stood uncrowded by lines, while the lips had not yet thinned and retreated inside the mouth’s dark cavern. There were still things to be said. Indeed, on my day of realisation I was outspoken as ever, reading newspaper print over a suited shoulder on the tube. I found something to remark on in the article, and didn’t hesitate to share this with the ear of the paper’s rather unremarkable owner. It was rush hour; we were jammed together, but none of the young people gave up their seats. I didn’t expect them to. Emerging overground amid office blocks, I was alive enough to ascend to my desk via the stairs; I did not consider myself on a descent to death in that moment. I studied the screen of my computer all morning, up to date with all the latest software and not in need of glasses to see it.

During my lunch break, I knew all the words to the song playing on an unseen radio in the sandwich bar. My brain was quick enough to calculate the change I was to get before the number flashed up in front of me on the till. I was young and cool enough to dine alone without being embarrassed or have strangers pity me. Or so I thought. Settling down at a table, I looked at a coin from the change I had been given. ‘ONE PENNY’, it announced. I played the game I always had with my sisters when I was younger: guessing what date would be on the back before I flipped it over. Rubbing it between my fingers, I examined its dirty colour. It looked extremely old, and I made a guess to match this observation. As I flipped it over with one hand, the other holding the sandwich  (which had, until then, been sailing towards my mouth) froze mid-air. I was five years older than this beaten brown penny. I was younger than you, but I knew then that I was not young any more. 

The wardrobe hadn’t always been next to the door. The first time I ever entered the room it stood by the window, tucked away neatly where the chimney jutted out, conspiring with the wall to make a perfect alcove for it. There it was unremarkable, noticeable only for its missing doorknob on the right hand side. Still, I was grateful for its presence. Its dark wood and broad stature made the bare walls surrounding it feel less lonely. I valued it enough to tell the room inspectors when they came that no, I would not like a different one- I could manage fine with the missing handle. 

It was different to any of the furniture I’d had at home. We’d moved houses several times over the years so that anything so grand and old had become impractical. All our things now popped up out of flat-packs, well suited to being moved from room to room as my mother’s whims so often commanded. Over the years, this constant shuffling had left bookshelves slanted, nails on the back of cupboards loose so that their backs curved outwards from their body, and drawers that wouldn’t close properly. When things inevitably fell apart, my sister and I would carry them awkwardly down the stairs and out the front door, where they waited on the curb side for the junk collection in the morning. They were always quickly and easily replaced. 

Apart from its missing handle, this wardrobe showed no signs of falling apart. Its only flaw turned the simple process of choosing clothes in to a ritual. I would have to pull the door on the left open first, revealing shelves of folded trousers and shirts, before I was able to tuck my fingers around the second door, opening it to see the dresses and other things promoted to the rail. This hanging space was where all my favourite things were kept; clothes that, despite being generous with my sister who was the same build as me, I could never bring myself to let her borrow. Dresses with unique prints, beautiful shirts that I had chanced upon on market stalls, tops with finely sewn details- they all meant something to me, somehow. I liked that the handle on the door in front of them was missing. I liked that they weren’t so readily accessible as the other clothes. 

This wardrobe belonged to an old building where I stayed whilst at University. Built in the nineteenth century, the room it stood in had seen hundreds of inhabitants over the years. I thought of all the clothes it must have had inside it, of the changes it must have seen. Being only let to me during the term time, I had to remove all my things in the holidays. When I came back for my final term, I could tell somebody had stayed in the room whilst I was away. The wardrobe had moved. 

The alcove now contained a little shelf which had before been placed next to the desk, while the wardrobe stood in the corner next to the door. The room felt smaller with it no longer tucked away, but somehow cosier. I liked the three doors in a row. It made it seem as though the wardrobe led somewhere, just as the door to the corridor did. It gave me an odd feeling of comfort and discomfort at the same time. For a long while after it had been moved there, if ever I had gone out and left my room unlocked, even for the time it took to get a drink from the kitchen, I would check inside the doors, expecting to find something I hadn’t seen before, or somebody hiding, perhaps. Of course, I never did. 

I’d heard of skeletons in closets before, and when I looked at that tall, stately wardrobe, I imagined I might haunt it in years to come. Perhaps it was already haunted; I couldn’t deny that girls who once stayed here must, by now, be dead. A girl might have had it positioned next to the door years ago and its return to that spot unconsciously made me expectant to find her there, standing inside the place that used to store her identity. It was large enough and deep enough to be a coffin for us both; our souls might hang there after our deaths in place of our favourite dresses whilst we considered where to move on to; while we decided what was behind the wooden back board that we could never see before. As we age, slowly, we find the clothes that suit us. Soon, they are all that is left. The places they were once homed in can never lose their importance. 

May: my darling favourite month, always. You were the first to acknowledge my existence, I am forever grateful for that; for the opening ten days of my life spent at the close of a month of blossoms beneath early summer sun. Bright but still clean, you never cling like August; never bloat with heat. Your skies stay fresh and peppermint blue, yet still warm. You are the glory of April’s spring without his incessant rain. You are thirty one days spent birthing Taurus and Gemini, dancing with girls who have long bare arms and flowers in their hair; with girls who wear pale floating dresses and spin with bright ribbons, you play with the first of the picnickers and see out the last of the umbrellas. You are sticky drinks outside without wasps, a ghost of a moon on a late evening blue, a calm so quiet we can hear the railway, a time so optimistic we are filled with hope. Lovely May, stay wonderful. 

Usually when I get new followers I don’t think much of it- I’m not as committed to this blog as I once was and so mentally assign you all a couple of weeks before you inevitably unfollow again. Lately I’ve had so many more new followers than I usually get, however; the number is (for some unknown reason) persistently increasing in a way that I feel I should do something about. I will try to write every day, which should be quite feasible seeing as I have very little obligations at the moment. I’m just finishing my first year at a lovely university, you see, and only have one exam left which I’m not all that worried about. We don’t have any lectures or seminars this term, so in theory I could write 24/7. The fact is, I don’t- sometimes I consider myself firmly to be a writer (success is irrelevant to this feeling) and sometimes I consider myself… I sat for a long while wondering what else I consider myself, and couldn’t think of anything. I therefore must be a writer, just an irregular one. You have been warned. 

(On another note, thank you to all the people who have continued to follow me for such a long time, through vast periods of my own inactivity. It does not go unnoticed.)